The Window

15 Hours After...

"Thank you." The less frightening of the two officers said as they stepped inside. Detective Tremblay maintained the same sour look on his face as he entered.

Tremblay. The name was indisputably Canadian. I thought that Canadians were supposed to be nice...

So, why did the detective seem to have his panties in a bunch?!

Tremblay set himself down on the couch, and grinned in a rather frightening manner. The other detective remained standing, less sure of himself.

My eyes lingered on his face for a few seconds as a sinking feeling began to envelop me.

I knew the other detective. It was Gary Davis. The same detective who'd questioned me about Wang's murder. I'd been unable to recognize him at first due to the fact that he'd shaved his beard and moustache off, altering his appearance considerably.

He was supposed to be a homicide detective!

Why the fuck was he following up on a missing persons investigation?! Did he already know that the girl was dead? What if he'd figured out that I'd lied to him? Or worse...what if he figured out the link between the girl and Wang?!

Manik still hadn't confirmed that he'd murdered Eric Wang. The girl from last night had been mentally unstable alright, but my gut told me that she'd been right when she'd accused Manik of murdering Wang. I was also extremely suspicious about the gun as well and all his inside knowledge of Wang's business.

I'd shut out all these questions until now but suddenly, a new wave of inquisitiveness and fear washed over me.

My palms were growing sweatier and my breath was quickening at a rapid pace.

I felt a sharp squeeze on my hand as I jolted out of my trance.

I looked to the side to see Manik giving me a look of caution. There wasn't a flicker of fear on his face. His impassive facial expression concealed any emotion he might have been feeling at that moment.

He lifted up his hand and used his lean fingers to push a lock of hair behind my ear.

"Stick with the story. Don't speak until spoken to. Understood?" He whispered to me.

I could feel my earlobe heating up, but I decided to control my lust for the time being and deal with the present situation.

I nodded in affirmation, as we walked towards the detectives.

Manik sat down on the chair opposite the detectives and I remained standing.

"Detectives, I'm Manik Malhotra. So, what's this about a missing persons case? How can I help?" He asked, in a tone of hollow eagerness.

I nearly scoffed at his question. He was far from the upstanding citizen he was pretending to be.

"We're here to speak with you about the disappearance of a woman named Luna Chan." Detective Tremblay said, condescendingly.

Detective Davis pulled his cellphone out of his pocket and held it up so that we could get a clear view of the screen.

I swallowed as I looked at the face of the ghost that had been haunting me for the past few hours. Suddenly, a cocktail of bile and pancreatic juice seemed to rise up in my throat and I had to wrestle with myself to keep it down.

At least, I could put a name to the corpse now, for better or for worse. Luna Chan- A pretty name. The way we left her, however...far from pretty.

"That's her. Her sister said that she went off the grid about a day or two ago. We've been investigating since yesterday. There were only dead ends...until we found one of the CCTV cameras that confirmed that she was in Tribeca last night...at a bar. The same bar you frequent." Detective Davis explained.